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Lays of Leisure Hours

By The Lady E. Stuart Wortley

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THE WILLING VICTIMS.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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THE WILLING VICTIMS.

Oh! Sorrows from Love's dark Dominion that flow,
Oh! tumults and turmoils—Oh! tempests and trials,
While we suffer the bitterest distractions of woe—
And wrath empties o'er us all its fearfullest vials!

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We pine in a chill bosom-solitude drear—
We sigh and we sadden, we mourn and we madden—
Our feelings grief-cankered no joy comes to cheer—
Our hearts overladen, no Hope comes to gladden.
And still we unceasingly groan and complain,
And deprecate ever Love's fatal dominion!
While we shrink from his charm—from his scourge and his chain,
And the sweep of his fiery—his Hurricane-Pinion!
But still who would wish from these evils to escape,
And, who from his tyrant would sunder and sever?
Oh! Love take thou Sorrow's worst, deadliest shape,
But let us still groan—willing Victims for ever!
Who but feels that e'er felt that deep Passion's wild sway,
Whate'er be the sufferings stern Fate deals unsparing,
Whate'er be the shadows Love throws round their way,
Not to Love were yet worse—than to Love on despairing.